About the Author

Earl Traut

No one has asked me this question, but it seems reasonable: "How
could someone who has not been formally educated in Greek and theology have the
audacity to write New Testament Greek word-studies?"

Here's my hopefully honest and humble response:

I studied engineering while in the U.S. Navy in 1944 and after
World War II completed my studies at the University of Wisconsin, receiving a
Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1948. I questioned the
authenticity of some of the concepts that were presented, such as 1) that ball
and roller bearings had been perfected and could not be improved, and 2) that
no simpler gas turbine principles or mechanisms were possible.

After graduation I began an engineering job with the Chrysler
Corporation in Detroit. I quit after six months because the work was
uninteresting.

So I signed up for the Navy's Flight School in Pensacola and
received my wings in 1951, after the Korean war had begun and received a
commission in the Marine Corps as a Second Lieutenant. I flew jet dive-bombers
in the Korean war and Medevac Helicopters in the Vietnam war, retiring from the
Marines in 1968 as a Lieutenant Colonel. My duties included much "paperwork"
and writing wherever I was assigned. My highest responsibilities were as
Commanding Officer of a 500 man Squadron at Jacksonville, North Carolina, and
Commanding Officer of a 260 man Helicopter Squadron in combat in Vietnam.

After retirement I worked as Production Engineer for a new
company in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, laying out the production line for a new
kind of Hydroski boat. The company was unsuccessful, so in 1970 when my
production layout was complete I resigned.

I had been working in my spare time with some ideas for a new
kind of gas turbine engine, and had applied for a patent on one of these. I
also began to seek answers to ball and roller bearing limitations and
improvements to the Wankel rotary engine mechanism. By 1980 I had received or
applied for over 20 U.S. patents.

Meanwhile, I was dissatisfied with existing New Testament translations and had
discovered that an interlinear Greek-English New Testament was a great help in
more accurately understanding the text. By 1975 I also noticed inconsistencies
in the interlinear New Testament.

I began to translate First Timothy to accurately understand it
but decided from its variations that I should do word-studies on each word to
achieve accuracy. But the lexicons used pagan Classical or Koine Greek contexts
to derive their word meanings, and some Greek words were not even translated.
So in about 1978 I began to allow the word usages in the New Testament Greek
text and context to determine word meanings.

At the same time, I was attempting to sell my patents, with zero
success. One evening in about 1980 as I was trying to figure out ways to sell
patents, this thought came into my mind: "Why are you trying to get more money
when I have already provided you with an income for life?" I understood this
message to mean that God wanted me to stop work on patents. So I did, ending up
with nineteen U.S. patents about gas turbines, rotary motors and ball bearings.

I also continued studying Greek, doing word-studies and
translating at a leisurely pace for my personal benefit, and to better prepare
me to teach the good news of Jesus to others. I thought about preparing the
word-studies for the benefit of others too. But later I thought to myself,
surely God couldn't use a non-theologically trained person like myself to write
such studies. So I asked him, "You don't want someone like me without a
seminary education in theology to do word- studies, do you?" The response was
immediate, "That's why I want you to do them."

Eventually I figured out that my method of questioning existing engineering
"truth" and seeking for basic answers may have been why I was being allowed to
do this task. After all, if the test aircraft crashes or the bridge collapses,
error is obvious and engineering redesign is obviously necessary. But errors in
New Testament translation may be unobvious, yet necessary to correct.

So, instead of accepting "ecclesiastically approved" seminary
doctrines, lexicons and translations, I felt compelled to seek out the most
basic information available from the Greek New Testament text.

After translating some 1500 words from Greek into English on the
basis of their New Testament usage, I discovered that many of these words were
already adequately translated, and that synonyms for them really were not earth
shaking discoveries.

But I did discover (or was nudged into discovering) that there
are many New Testament Greek contexts (and thus Greek words) which have
"spiritual" applications, but which have been translated on the basis of words
derived from pagan Greek contexts; that is, the classical Greek writings and
Koine Greek writings of the First Century A.D. After all, how could idolatrous
pagans know anything about spiritual matters, much less the relationship
between humans and God?

Beginning in about 1985 I began to put greater emphasis on these
"spiritual" New Testament Greek contexts, and to spend more time on the
derivation of their word-meanings.

Then in 1991 The Christian Bible was published by Christian Bible
Translators, Inc. Most of the work was done by Alan Donaldson, whom I
gratefully thank for his excellent research and results. He listed 106
erroneous words from existing English translations and corrected them on the
basis of Koine (First Century A.D.) Greek and greatly improved the English
text. Alan found better English words, such as "pure" rather than "holy" or
"sanctified," "older one" rather than "elder" and "group of called ones" rather
than "church." I have, with gratitude, taken the liberty of using some of these
improved words, because some of them seem to be the most concise, accurate
terms available.

But even with its improvements The Christian Bible had one major
flaw. It based many of its words on the pagan "Koine" Greek language.

My word-studies have attempted to translate EVERY New Testament
Greek word into English on the basis of ONLY the New Testament Greek
contexts, even those which represent inexact concepts such as "adultery" and
"hell." Amazingly, God has provided a definition of each word or has provided
sufficient context to translate EVERY Greek word which has a "spiritual"
significance!

At this time (August 2001) word-studies for ninety-seven of these
words with a "spiritual" connotation are included in this web-site. But there
are at least a dozen more which may eventually be included.

Please note that many of the older word-studies do not include
enough detail, especially those that have not been updated since the mid to
late 1980's. I will revise them as soon as I can.